The things I learned from leveraging internal mobility at Oda

Feeling like you should be doing something else, or just curious what else there is? Fear not — literally. Changing roles and career paths can be extremely fun, rewarding, but most importantly multidirectional.

I want to share with you how I moved from living in fear of disappointing others over my own ambitions to the fulfillment of giving away all my legos and grabbing some new ones within Oda.

I was at a point where I felt I had done everything I could do in my role and wanted something new to challenge me. I looked ahead at what I could do if I made a linear shift, and it didn’t ignite my passion the way I wanted. So, I decided to take a U-turn, one of those unexpected career changes that even had my father ask me, “Hey, are you sure you want to start all over and leave what you are good at for something you don’t know if you’ll even like?”

A little more than a year ago I said yes to an internal career shift that, at the time, had me both terrified and excited. I wasn’t entirely sure where leaving my safe nest over at Talent Acquisition to become a Project Manager in Oda’s Infrastructure & IT Area would lead. Questions I asked myself ranged everywhere from would I find it fun, to would I be able to contribute or understand anything at all, which was one of my biggest fears at the time. Today, I can safely say that it’s been one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.

Who was I when I decided to take a chance on change?

I had a degree in Human Resources, worked my way up in a recruitment company, and then become the first Tech Recruiter at Oda, joining at the time where we wanted to increase our Product and Tech organization tenfold. And we did it; we built up our employer brand, designed recruitment processes with intention and care, and hired over 100 amazing colleagues within Product, Data, Design, and Engineering in 18 months (2020).

So, I knew talent acquisition, and I felt an enormous amount of ownership and pride in all we had built and accomplished as a team. It was a safe space, and I was good at my job. But I wanted to try something else, not because I wasn’t happy, but because I was so curious to know if I too could be part of that cool-cat club called Tech. Could I join the squad I had been part of hiring? That I was so fond of and admired so much?

I could, so I did, and I love it.

Maybe you want to do this yourself, but the same kinds of fears are holding you back. If that’s true, let me tell you not only what you can do to make that change yourself, but also what your organization needs to do to enable employee growth and multidirectional career development successfully.

What I did

I just want to dedicate some space to address fear, because that stuff is holding you back more than anything else, I promise. You know that feeling of being numbed with fear of disappointing the people around you? Or scared you won’t be any good at what you are daydreaming of doing?

Yup, I know it too. But if you’re longing for a change, you need to learn to beat your fear back. Facing fears is liberating and I have never lowered my pulse faster than when I finally said out loud to my manager that I wanted to consider a change. The worst was suddenly over, and it went well (more about that psychological safety at work later).

Here are a few tips on what helped me secure a job in Tech without having any kind of “typical” tech background:

• Do well where you are — don’t underestimate the importance of past experience. I love this article about Titles, as so often we feel we need to show relevant experience by having a “relevant title”. Even if you’re not in the same kind of role as you want to move on to next, your experience, results, and approach to solving any problem or project is part of your future toolbox. Don’t underestimate your experience.
• Learn more about the opportunities — read job descriptions, often. They are a good indicator to help trigger interest. If you read a description you find interesting, then you’ll know who you can speak with next.
• Understanding more how tech teams are organized — understanding more about why the most innovative tech companies build up their teams the way they do gives you the reassurance that the best places to be are the ones where a multi-disciplinary approach to solving problems is the default. You read that right: you don’t need to know everything or be exactly like the people who are already in the job. A well-functioning team complements itself, with a wide range of experience, knowledge, and focus.
• Speak with your network — tell people, colleagues, or friends that you find what they do interesting and listen to how they got into it themselves. You’ll be surprised by how many people ended up where they are by coincidence, or just by trying. When broadening your network and speaking with people, you’ll realize most people have experienced growth in a familiar fashion. Reach out; people are often open to chatting over coffee.
• Demonstrate your willingness to learn — try signing up for a course, or start a project. I actually signed up for a Bachelors’s in Computer Science at the University of Oslo in 2020; I was planning on doing it full-time, next to my full-time recruiter job, so I could learn some foundational stuff. I ended up leaving the course three months after changing jobs, as I learned I did not need to code to work in tech. I had other strong foundations I could build on.
• Most importantly (and what will eventually get you into the right conversations) — just tell the hiring manager you want the job or something like it.

Workshop facilitation from our Oda office in Berlin, Kreuzberg

What Oda did

I’m not gonna lie, 50% of securing a new job or career change, is down to you. But the other 50% is the company and the people within it. If you’re working in a high-trust environment that creates a space around you and gives people a sense of psychological safety, talking about career change is going to be slightly easier. Psychological safety is the belief that you can speak up without the risk of punishment or humiliation. This, in turn, is well established as a critical driver of high-quality decision making, greater innovation, more effective execution in organizations, healthy group dynamics, and interpersonal relationships. It can lower the barrier, so let people know you’re curious about a change.

Since I joined in 2019, Oda has always been open to considering internal mobility and multidirectional development, with a high level of curiosity toward those individuals who are open about their desire to develop and grow. We’ve had many noteworthy internal moves at Oda, and I would like to highlight some of my female colleagues (in honor of Women’s History Month) and their remarkable career development at Oda:

• Siri: Data Analyst turned Product Manager
• Kristin: Business Developer, Strategy turned Managing Director, Norway
• Sofie: Customer Service Manager turned Project Manager, Growth
• Hilde: UX & Service Designer turned Growth Strategist
• June: Customer Service Agent turned Privacy Engineer
• Marielle: Business Developer turned Director of Product Strategy

Companies should care deeply about enabling talent to grow. As market research shows, one of the top reasons people choose to leave their job is lack of development or growth opportunities, but as Oda’s core values state: “We are here to stay”, “We care about people” and “We shoot for the stars”. These are behaviors that permeate everything we do, both internal and external, so naturally they also apply to nurturing our talent.

While people and companies are both traditionally used to thinking of career progress as linear, I would argue that the largest playgrounds for learning, development, and high employee engagement can be found in many non-linear directions. We provide employees with a compass to present and discuss opportunities, and give them increased flexibility in switching roles between individual contributors and leadership tracks, and making cross-functional moves. The change in role doesn’t need to be at a higher level or even the same domain.

Personally, I had a great experience reaching out to Mats — who was hiring for the IT Project Manager role. We were already having a conversation about the role (so I could help him hire for the role, ironically). But once I asked, “Would you ever consider me?” I remember he straightened up his relaxed posture and said, “Yes, of course! Let’s talk more.”

So, if you’re a hiring manager and you’re lucky enough to have someone reach out to you about an opportunity — someone who wants to stretch themselves and take on a bigger challenge — I really encourage you to hear them out. Rarely are people more motivated and engaged than when someone gives them a chance.

If you like, you can always reach out to me at sabrina@oda.com, for a coffee in person in Berlin or Oslo — or a Google Meet ☕️

Sabrina